Saw this on RedVee, mentioned in the RL papers this week.

I hope not. But, it would sum up everything that is wrong with our club at the moment.

No chance. It's highly questionable if he's even first choice any more. He's had long spells out of the side where he's not been injured this season.

I suspected we would keep one of Meli or Ade, but for me he offers little mor than being an overall very average player. If its greatly reduced, perhaps its fair enough. I'm sure they'll give him a coaching job the year after aswell.

There's young exciting wingers like Dixon and Brown that have been available and we've passed on them. Whilst overall they're probably no better or worse than Ade, they are young (so have scope to imrove) and they are quick (which is something very important).

Its not totally crazy, but it sure is unambitious.

Well, he's been interviewed in League Express and appears convinced he's getting a new deal, which he hopes is two years.

Very poor.

My thoughts exactly.

Ade has, during periods of his career, been very good at attacking high balls.

Perhaps with the recruitment of Walsh, this is going to be a [igo to[/i play for us?

I can only think of two times he's done that. Brisbane in the World Club Championships and Leeds last season. It's a totally stupid move to resign a player based on that, especially given Ade hasn't got the pace to be in position for those enough to make it a threat.

2006 Grandfinal?

See my overall thoughts on it above, but it may be a little bit of a silver lining if he does resign. Plus, we haven't had anyone that has been delivering that sort of kick in recent years, have we?

Gardner consistently makes a hash of competing for high balls and if only three instances of him actually taking one can be recalled in a career spanning ten years then that suggests he is very poor. In fact, the only thing going for Ade is his kick returns. He doesn't have pace, he isn't exactly a great finisher (at least not these days), his defence is iffy and his ability under the bomb debatable.

I wouldn't be at all surprised if all our OOC contract players were re-signed but I wouldn't agree with any of them being re-signed myself, bar Laffranchi on the basis of him playing in the second row and even then I'd be 50/50 on it.

Awfull decision by the club if true? These signing's are the reason were sitting 8th place and looking at a 6th loss on the trot?
Send him on his way with a big thank you

It would surprise me, given the injuries he's had, given the recent experience of keeping players too long. Given that we would not offer Longy a 2 year deal. Only a few years back.

He was very good at it around the 2006-07 period, but he's had period where he's been equally as dreadful.
I can only think that the club are panicking about replacing two old wingers at once, even though we have have Swift and Makinson who are in many ways as capable as Ade.

Does the club not have any young wingers? It seems like we always use young standoffs/centres as back up in order to break them in. Makinson stuck there, but he was a centre originally. What young wingers do we have?

I've been prepared to be patient with Brown, as he has had a lot of rubbish to deal with since taking over. I can accept a bit of short-term suffering if there is a clear plan to get things changed, both in terms of our style of play and the scale of our ambitions.

If we give a two year contract to Gardner that will suggest to me that no such plans are in place, and I will really begin to worry about the future of the club.

It cannot be true. It simply cannot be true. The likes of Briscoe is available and we're gonna offer a 45 year old winger a new 2 year deal?

Stick a fork in us. We're done.

Who knows? We never get to see them. Either we don't produce specialist wingers or our young wingers are actually players playing on the wing but are better elsewhere on the pitch. In the short years I've been watching Saints (since 2007 on a regular basis), I have simply never seen us play an indentified young winger on the wing. They've always been something else. It's like we see the wing spot more as a means of blooding a young backline player rather than as a spot in itself.

But whichever way we play it, keeping Meli and Gardner on the wings for another two years is not the way forward. The rest of our backline will be faster than the wingers and that is just ludicrous.

Unless this means we have given up on the hunt for a Winger???

It's not really replacing 2 old wingers if both Ade and Meli go. Makinson is well versed in RL now, he's not really what I would call a youngster. Although it's worrying if we only have 2 wingers for next year in Ade and Makinson.

Surely we should be scouting the Athletics clubs of the UK for their top runners, they will only be drawing down a few £k in lottery funding. For most they will never hit big money in Athletics. It's not beyond the concept of man to find 2 or 3 15 year olds who are lightening fast and train them for 3 years with rugby ball into how to play wing.

According to Brown in his latest statement though contracts aren't simply his choice. They're the result of discussion with Rush and 'all the coaching staff'.

Meli is better than Gardner. So does he get a new deal too? And if not, why not?

To be fair, I've often looked at wingers as poor relations on the pitch. In the junior teams, if a players got the star quality to be a future SL player, you tend to want them getting hold of the ball more often, rather than on the wing, waiting to be serviced.

I'm tempted to agree.
Whilst he has a reasonable track record, there's always this nagging feeling that our faith in brown is slightly misplaced, fueled for me by continuous inclusion of Wellens in key positions and a couple of other bizarre choices on the pitch. I hope its wrong.

Mmm, its obviously a team of guys that cover the signings - scouts to go out and look at players, Mike Rush to overseas the total spend etc, but surely the head coach should be saying "don't resign him (gardner), I need better"?

That's a worrying comment.

You would think so but that doesn't appear to be how it works. Unless there is an element of back covering of course.

Broughton and Briscoe are both out of contract, we should be going for them. They are both young players who can still improve and in Briscoe's case is a current international who can cover a few positions. Gardner and Meli are both out of contract, with their wage we can improve that positon and improve the squad elsewhere with Makinson and Swift fighting it out for the other spot.

Gardner has been a good, solid pro for us but he's bee in and out for the last 2 and a half years due to injury and form, there is no reason to keep him.

Briscoe yes, Broughton no. I really don't see what fans see in him. Yes he's quick, but so was Kevin Penny. There's a reason why he has been at Leeds then Hull then Salford.